Living With Strangers
Living With Strangers
There are many different societies and cultures in the world and they all have different unspoken rules and routines. There are things that are acceptable in one culture and not in another. In “Living With Strangers” an essay written by Siri Hustvedt in 2002, Siri explains some of these untold rules. Siri describes how she used to live in Minnesota and how much contact people made with each other in Minnesota, in contrast to New York. She talks about how the people from Minnesota find it almost rude if people don’t greet each other, when they are passing by. In 1978 she moves to New York and quickly realizes that no one says hello to each other in New York, there is just too many people for that. This part of her essay shows us the big differences between cultures and this is in the same country. That means no limits towards the differences between the cultures.
The title “Living With Strangers” indicates how lonely you can feel living in a big city. Siri thinks that we are becoming more and more isolated because of the increasing number of humans on this planet. She describes how she imagines her neighbors as roommates, because of all the private things she witnesses in her first apartment in New York, such as huge discussions downstairs and the guys wearing only underwear across her window. Despite the fact that Siri and her neighbors have shared so many private moments, she can only see them as her fellow New Yorkers and therefore she is “Living With Strangers”.
Siri is very fascinated by this untold rule/law the New Yorkers use in certain situations and it goes like this: "PRETEND IT ISN’T HAPPENING” (p.1 L.20), this means, that New Yorkers tries not to interfere in uncomfortable situations. This rule/law makes New Yorkers less social and a lot more isolated from other citizens. This is also a big problem for all the people who move to New York to meet new people. The law makes it very hard if not impossible to get to know
There are many different societies and cultures in the world and they all have different unspoken rules and routines. There are things that are acceptable in one culture and not in another. In “Living With Strangers” an essay written by Siri Hustvedt in 2002, Siri explains some of these untold rules. Siri describes how she used to live in Minnesota and how much contact people made with each other in Minnesota, in contrast to New York. She talks about how the people from Minnesota find it almost rude if people don’t greet each other, when they are passing by. In 1978 she moves to New York and quickly realizes that no one says hello to each other in New York, there is just too many people for that. This part of her essay shows us the big differences between cultures and this is in the same country. That means no limits towards the differences between the cultures.
The title “Living With Strangers” indicates how lonely you can feel living in a big city. Siri thinks that we are becoming more and more isolated because of the increasing number of humans on this planet. She describes how she imagines her neighbors as roommates, because of all the private things she witnesses in her first apartment in New York, such as huge discussions downstairs and the guys wearing only underwear across her window. Despite the fact that Siri and her neighbors have shared so many private moments, she can only see them as her fellow New Yorkers and therefore she is “Living With Strangers”.
Siri is very fascinated by this untold rule/law the New Yorkers use in certain situations and it goes like this: "PRETEND IT ISN’T HAPPENING” (p.1 L.20), this means, that New Yorkers tries not to interfere in uncomfortable situations. This rule/law makes New Yorkers less social and a lot more isolated from other citizens. This is also a big problem for all the people who move to New York to meet new people. The law makes it very hard if not impossible to get to know